


elisha tells me the sun is gone

by rosewitchx



Series: god of arepo [2]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Angst, Dead Jschlatt (Video Blogging RPF), Dead Wilbur Soot, Escape, Gen, Good Jschlatt (Video Blogging RPF), Mind Control, Post-Apocalypse, Prison, Sensory Deprivation, welp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:02:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28614045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewitchx/pseuds/rosewitchx
Summary: Connor escapes from the Vault with a little outside help. Connor realizes there is nowhere to escape to.--Or, Schlatt lies.
Relationships: Connor | ConnorEatsPants & Jschlatt, Connor | ConnorEatsPants & Wilbur Soot, Jschlatt & Wilbur Soot
Series: god of arepo [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2096694
Comments: 1
Kudos: 34





	elisha tells me the sun is gone

**Author's Note:**

> title: eliseo - la vida boheme
> 
> yeah i continued the connor fic i think my streamer deserves it what about it  
> it's been a rough couple of days. sue me

Canonically, he’s not supposed to be dead. And yet here he is, a ghost, but not quite.

He walks through the quiet hallways of the Vault, careful not to step on the Vines. He feels the prison thrumming with energy, and he’s headed right to its heart.

“Ghostbur,” he whispers. He knows even the faintest of noises can alert the Egg to his presence. He knows his fellow sorta-spirit is following him; the air blurs around his silhouette, around the edges of where his sweater should be. Invis pots are good, but not perfect, especially up-close like this. Still, he makes sure: “Ghostbur, are you there?”

“Yes! Hello,” the ghost laughs faintly, like this is all a game to him. Sometimes he hates him for it, for his unintentional naivety and childishness. Acting like an adult (like the adult he used to be, in fact) would’ve probably saved quite a few of their friends. 

_ You don’t have any friends here,  _ he tells himself.  _ You killed them all yourself.  _

He silences those thoughts, feeling the air grow cold around him. There would be time to hate himself later. He has a mission here, a promise to fulfill. And he  _ will  _ fulfill it. 

“Ghostbur,” he says, straining to keep himself quiet, so as to not make the Vines aware of his presence, “I need you to do me a favor, buddy.”

The world suddenly explodes with light. 

Connor whimpers, trying to jerk his face away from it all, but there’s no escaping the absolute brightness that has invaded his prison cell. It all hurts so badly; faintly, in the back of his mind, he registers the fact that he’s able to see at all as  _ wrong,  _ but he’s too overwhelmed to really process it. 

“Hello!” He hears then. It’s the voice of an old friend. His eyes are still adjusting to the light, but he thinks he makes out the edges of a silhouette by the wall, slowly approaching. “Oh, you look sad. Don’t be sad! Have some blue.”

The entity smears something across his cheek, like a paste. He doesn’t register that he's crying until the person’s thumb brushes away at his tears. He tells himself it’s just a remnant of the blindness. From up close, at least, he realizes who it is: Wilbur’s ghost, who he hasn’t seen in so long. He looks as grey and as blissfully unaware as ever. 

“What are you doing,” he croaks. “They need you out there.”

“Friend told me to come here,” he confesses, like he’s conspiring. “It’s a breakout!”

Connor’s heart beats faster. “You’re joking.”

“Nope! He’s in the control room. He told me to keep you company, said you’d need it?”

If he’s being completely honest, he’d rather not have anyone see him in complete agony at all, but he appreciates Glatt and Ghostbur’s attempt. “Thank you,” he whispers. “Always could count on you.”

Ghostbur smiles. It’s the first thing Connor has seen in months. The room feels a little less cold already.

The ghost starts working, carefully, on the wires connected to his spine and head. Every disconnection is blessed pain, burning through the already-damaged nerves as the wires are severed from his body. He can feel the Vault scream and writhe as his power abandons it and returns to him.  _ Good, you abomination,  _ he wants to seethe at it.  _ How’s it fucking feel, bitch? _

And maybe this is the reason he doesn’t notice anything’s off, at first. Maybe it’s his euphoria at being finally freed. Maybe it’s the way his power, holy and sacred, overwhelms him, blinds him yet again for moments. Maybe it’s the way Ghosbur keeps muttering reassurances at him -  _ don’t worry, it’s all right, just a little more! _

So he doesn’t notice, at first. 

The moment he’s completely free from the Core he crumbles to the floor, the obsidian cool and overwhelming against his bare skin. The surface is smooth and shiny and chilly and he almost cries at the sensation. But Ghostbur is holding a hand out to him and he remembers the direness of their situation: they cannot stay here. 

“Right,” he whimpers, struggling to get back up - even leaning against the wall. “Right, let’s move.”

Ghostbur leads him through the entrance to his cell (now deactivated without him powering it and slightly ajar), and the moment he steps out of it, stumbling a little, he sees red. The vines he had heard so much about but hadn’t actually  _ seen  _ before today are everywhere, on the walls, ceiling, on almost every square inch of the floor. They exude this… this  _ energy,  _ overpowering and foul, like rotten eggs but for the soul. It’s disgusting. He wants to go back inside. He wants to sit back in the machine. Would Ghostbur plug him back in? He would have to connect himself again, wire by wire, surely. It was painful, being one with the Core, but it’s for the best. He misses it already. It was cold and familiar and  _ lovely and big and it loved him.  _

What?

“Connor?” Ghostbur says. His eyes finally snap away from the vines as he looks at the phantom; even he looks unnerved by this whole mess. “We have to keep going. Friend is waiting for us.”

Right. 

The red things, like pulsating veins, call for him. Connor tries to pick up the pace. “Don’t step on them,” Ghostbur instructs him. “Touching them is  _ bad.  _ Everyone went a little— a little—“ 

The ghost stops. Connor attempts to move around the vines. “Ghostbur?”

“Don’t touch them,” the ghost mutters. “Just don’t.”

_ Come back,  _ the Core seems to scream at him. The hallway glows red. He looks back to his cell: a puddle of blood and energy has dried out underneath the cursed chair where he’d been immobilized. 

“No thanks,” he whispers at the Core, turning around and pushing towards Ghostbur — towards his friends. 

As they progress the hallways become messier, darker, only illuminated by the red glow of the Crimson. He tries his hardest to avoid the pulsating things, and they move slowly towards the exit, even as his body screams, even as the energy within himself fails to grow stronger. 

“C’mon, c’mon,” Ghostbur chants, “you can do this!”

And so he continues to move forward.

It hurts. Fuck, it hurts so badly.

Making it out of the inner Vault is easier said than done, but now that it’s devoid of power, it’s doable, and only takes them half an hour, even straining and in pain as he is. From there they take a detour; they have to pick up Glatt, after all, and Ghostbur isn’t willing to leave him alone with all the vines. So they head together to the control room. The thing is overgrown, and Connor has to wait outside, as the Crimson blocks the door and Ghostbur phases into it.

It’s calling to him, he realizes now. From the beating plants to the corrupted obsidian walls of the prison, it beckons him:  _ come back,  _ it says,  _ come to us,  _ and the worst part is that every passing second he wants it, more and more. He misses being connected to it, misses it being the only thing he could ever feel.

“None of that,” Schlatt’s saying. Connor blinks; his old friend is standing right before him, like he knows what he’s thinking. “Look at me, buddy. We can’t stay.”

“Schlatt,” he mumbles, dazed. He’s so exhausted. “You came for me.”

“I did,” Schlatt confirms. His hands, translucent and dead yet still  _ warm,  _ squeeze his shoulder. _That's weird,_ Connor thinks. “Ready to leave this shithole?”

_ Come back,  _ the Vault says.  _ Come back,  _ the Crimson says.  _ There’s nowhere else. There’s nothing else. _

(He doesn’t notice, at first.) 

Connor nods, and the ghost of his best friend leads him towards salvation.

Or so he thinks.

They stand at the gates, the big ones. Behind them, his former friends wail for him.

_ “Come back,”  _ Skeppy cries.

_ “It’s so nice here,”  _ Cara breathes.

_ “Aren’t you cold?”  _ Bad whimpers.

They can’t move. The Crimson has overtaken them, just as it has so many others. It occurs to him then, strangely, that his cell might have been the only space in the entirety of the Vault that  _ wasn’t  _ controlled by the alien thing. 

“Can’t we help them?” Connor asks Glatt. Something in his chest screams. He knows it's just instinct - the need to nurture, to shelter. “They look in pain.”

“There’s nothing we can do,” the ghost says. “Unless you want to ‘take them out’.”

Connor falls silent. Ghostbur sniffles. Glatt takes in a deep breath and presses his palm against the door.

“I should probably preface this by saying I’m sorry,” he says.

“For what?” Connor asks.

Slowly, working on reserve power, the gates open, just a crack. Red light filters in from the outside as well. Connor’s heart drops. 

“I’m sorry,” the ghost of the former president apologizes. “I lied. There’s no one waiting. It’s just us, buddy.”

Almost every inch of the world outside is Crimson. Even the sky seems red, hazy with ash and spore. It smells rotten, like blood and poison and dark magic.

_ Aren’t you cold?  _ It screams at him.

_ Come back,  _ it screams at him.

He wants nothing more than to collapse on the ground and scream. But Schlatt’s already walking through the gates, and Ghostbur is holding Connor’s hand. 

“Fuck,” he chokes out. “ _ Fuck, _ ” is all he manages, before following in his friend’s footsteps and stepping into the end of the world.


End file.
